sick

…which makes it rather difficult to blog. I have no idea why I thought I’d have plenty of time to catch up on all of of this while I was off of work. Most likely because I’m not used to taking anything stronger than ibuprofen and I underestimated my mental state or even my conscious state while on something stronger (I DID learn, however, that there are some painkillers I cannot take, and ended up back in the hospital after a week of them).

What kind of surgery did I have? The kind that is very humiliating to talk about. I finally had to bite the bullet and get it done because 1) it was painful and was only getting worse, 2) I was having to use up my vacation time to cover on days where I could suffer through the first attack and then schedule the next few days off, and 3) the times I couldn’t schedule off in advance-I was taking hits to my attendance, which can get you fired rather quickly when working for my company.

There were a lot of things I had read in preparation for this, and let me tell you that the amount of pain I was warned about was sooooooo true. Some of the things that I found online that had suggestions on how to cope with recovery were useful, some were not useful, and one or two made things worse. I’d love to do a write up on it, but then I’d have to actually admit to what I had done…. and it’s kinda embarrassing to so. Maybe I’ll get over the embarrassment one day, or maybe I’ll post it somewhere else.

But I’m finally off the painkillers (except for those occasional evenings when things get worse), and can coherently write again. Seriously, my Facebook entries while on the second set of painkillers had references to giant robot penises and other odd things (the first set of painkillers only kept me unconscious and never actually managed the pain, which is why I ended up back in the hospital with a different set of drugs).

So I’m back. And too late for all the Halloween stuff I put together too. I guess I’ll just save them for next year since I have them pretty much ready to go other than some final editing. But I have some cool Thanksgiving stuff! And Thanksgiving’s this week! …which means I’ll have to wait until next year for those as well… this sucks.

It’s now time to go and get ready for the Doctor’s visit that will determine when I’m allowed to go back to work, so I guess I’ll leave you with a photo of Nemo keeping my feet warm while I was sick:

This was probably the best thing that came out of this past month. Other than the giant robot penis comment on Facebook.

I think I picked up my cold last weekend during our trip to a rampaging germ factory to see Yo Gabba Gabba Live with two of our little friends. The show was fun, but it wasn’t worth the snogged head and drippy nose all week.

Luckily we have Netflix. After the first day spent doing nothing but sleeping, I toddled out to the living room and started flipping through our online movie queue–that’s where “Zombie Strippers” and “Raptor Island” came from. The first was because I thought it would be funny (it’s painful), and the latter because I had heard it was so bad that it was good (it was painful AND boring). So I gave up and finished off season one of “Psych”.

By the next day, “Psych” had me tossing a street pizza in my own living room (am I the only person who thinks of a street pizza when I see the ad for Taco Cabana’s Street Tacos? Really?). Not because the episode wasn’t good, but the first show of season two had me laughing so hard that I couldn’t breathe. Combine not breathing with a stuffed up nose and strong gag reflex and I was puking along with the duet at the end. How I truly love Tim Curry.

By Friday I had run out of sick time and dragged my somewhat incoherent ass to work so I could infect all the people who will be working overtime to answer questions about our company’s consumer products after Christmas. I was cranky and pissy for most of the shift until I stopped by Head Nurse’s blog to catch up on the past week.

Her latest post was about how she felt about talking to her own patients about her recent and unexpected experience with oral cancer:

There’s more, but my nose is runny enough as it is. Reading her stuff reminds me of what a whiney, unappreciative person I become when I’m sick… and sometimes when I’m not sick.

Last night about 9 pm, I started feeling better. In fact, I suddendly felt well enough to clean up the living room a little while watching more “Psych”. Tonight I feel well enough to take on a week’s worth of kitchen neglect plus starting all the Christmas cookie baking that I’m behind on, but I’m not quite well enough to hit the hockey game.